he managed to ride just over 48,479km between April and his last ride, with 19,400km over the last 48 days (i.e. just over 400km per day)

Now, Strava does indeed think that he has ridden 30,479.2m in 2015 (~49,000km), but his Strava-recorded total for the last 48 days (25 Sep-12 Nov) is 8,979 miles (13727km). THAT is double-counting the many Group Activities where Miles has erroneously uploaded the same activity twice (I think this happens if you're uploading via that horrible Garmin Connect? His records only start showing this defect from October - where his mileage chart appears to go upwards!) Maybe this is the source of his confusion about how far he'd gone - was he just looking at the weekly mileage bar charts on Strava? Take for example the week 26 Oct - 1 Nov:

Crediting him with the longer of the two distances for every ride double-counted gives him2.4+90.6+35.4+52.8+2.5+2.3+92.6+60+0+60.5+0+0.8+64.5+58.5+58.1+6.3+4.5+57.7+59.0+4.0+28.5+1.6+39.0+38.0+38.0+42.1+30.0+4.+2.5+121.3+3.4 = 1061.4 milesThe eleven doubly-counted rides come to62.5+35.1+2.2+91.6+60.2+63.5+57.9+3.8+37.9+29.9+3.1 = 447.7 miles

So, whereas Miles actually only rode 1061.4 miles in a week (151.6 mpd, 0.737 Godwins), he might think he rode 1509.1 (or the Strava-totalled 1510.7, which will exclude, I think, rounding errors) (215.6mpd, 1.048 Godwins). (Surely it can't be that difficult to tell the difference between a 151.6mpd week and a 215.6mpd week? Does arithmetic work differently on the other side of the planet?)

Still nowhere near the 250mpd that the article quotes, but maybe an explanation for the misplaced optimism? The only viable explanation to make up the difference is that he has rides which are not logged on Strava, but, given that the UMCA rules have strict stipulations that rides should be logged on Strava, it is churlish to argue that unproven miles should be verified. Given his team's level of recording ineptitude, it is a bit rich to vent in the article about "frustrations over inaccurate UMCA records"!

red marley

Thanks Legs for the analysis and explanation. That makes sense and is closer to my own records of his progress too. One minor detail, UMCA do not require a Strava record (http://ultracycling.com/sections/records/data/hamr/official_results/) so the fact that Strava is incorrectly accumulating multiple overlapping ride submissions isn't itself an official record problem (although it does make it harder for the rest of us, and, as you suggest, may have in part let to team Miles' own confusion).

"...with 19,400km over the last 48 days (i.e. just over 400km per day)..."

Seems his mileage records weren't agreeing with UCMA's

"The last 48 days" when Miles uploaded rides cover the time span from 26th September to 12th November.

23rd September is the starting day of his 3rd record attempt (as presented in the UMCA's "official results"-file). So the article claims he left the HAMR with his current attempt being around +20% above the Godwin-line!?

The UMCA's official results give a total of 7137 miles for his last 48 days, indicating that the double-counting mentioned by legs applies to about 1800 miles on Strava.When I sporadically tried to retrace Miles' facebook-entries I did not find hints of lost miles/ rides in his Strava-account.

Getting ready for Alpine Classic, both The Journey & The Limit (High Routeurs Society -http://www.highrouleur.cc/the-rules/ ) and a couple of Everest's not to mention the Audax Tour of Tasmania. I'm in touch with the Guinness Book of Records re the last month of the HAM'R, when I rode over 400 KM's per day (12,000 km's/7,700 miles) after several months of riding, and doing the 365 day challenge without middlemen changing the rules from a distance challenge to a number of days spent on the bike, irrespective of the distance ridden challenge.

Getting ready for Alpine Classic, both The Journey & The Limit (High Routeurs Society -http://www.highrouleur.cc/the-rules/ ) and a couple of Everest's not to mention the Audax Tour of Tasmania. I'm in touch with the Guinness Book of Records re the last month of the HAM'R, when I rode over 400 KM's per day (12,000 km's/7,700 miles) after several months of riding, and doing the 365 day challenge without middlemen changing the rules from a distance challenge to a number of days spent on the bike, irrespective of the distance ridden challenge.

I saw that. What a very weird post. Miles may be a nice chap and all, but there is considerable delusion going on there, not to mention nonsense about rules being changed.

"All up a 1,800 long weekend,. Starting to build from maintenance to strengthening mode for July kick off (split Oz winter into two) for the HAM'R WR Challenge. The 'Doored' shoulder was fine, the fingers at 4:30 at the top of Mt Buffalo less so, must get me some of those full fingered gloves The ride up to and back from Wang on the Hume was great as the emergency services and support organisations were all doing the driver reviver thing,. Great Sausage Sanger's (with Onions) by the SES. Only one punishment pass, but it was a good one, full strength truck air horn and a good four foot incursion into the Emergency Stopping Lane at 100 Kmp at Seymour going South. Ah, what can you do, even in the ranks of the professional drivers you get them. However for the record, those the guys that drive those things deserve medals for what they have to put up with in their work environment."

I've met Miles a couple of times and he's nice chap but does seem somewhat bonkers. This time he's planning to do a significant portion of his HAMR attempt on a mountain bike. He has a couple of Giant XTC hardtails modified with his trademark gigantic chainrings and slick tyres fitted. He loves them but I'm not convinced that this is the easy option for trying to beat Amanda's record.

It does seem that he's learned a bit from his first attempt, though. One of his recent Facebook posts (possibly in a closed group) mentioned that he's been doing a lot more planning and preparation this time around. I wish him luck - he'll certainly need it!

After the recent tragic loss of Mike Hall and remembering Miles' injuries from his first attempt, I also have to wonder about the wisdom of trying to take the record on Australian roads. I hope, at the very least, that he's going to aim for quieter roads this time and not spend most of his time bombing down major highways.

Marketing is surely not one of his strengths (nor transparency). The Facebook-entry below is his first after starting the HAM'R.

https://www.facebook.com/GoMilesAU/I just tried to dele at two rides I did on the 2nd, 10 kms each, to ensure that it did not confuse the verification guys (I started the HAM'R this morning) at 10 AM PDT 2nd July (LA time) 3AM 3rd July Melbourne time. As I hit the ride selection, I missed and hit this morning ride to Geelong, 3AM start time, after which I caught the 5.55 AM train back to Melbourne, then the 7.11 AM train to Seymour to start ride two. The Hume south bound was closed this morning due to a car roll over south of Tallarook. I've checked on spotracker and this has been overwritten, ...

Logged

whosatthewheel

... at least he seems to be quick... I think you need to be quick for this kind of record... speed buy you rest time... if you can do 360 km a day spending 12 hours or less on the saddle, it's a good start

Miles can certainly ride. He has trouble operating technology and gets impatient and, although originally a brit, he now has a very 'Australian' attitude which can be a bit grating.This is his third attempt, I believe. First stalled on injury, 2nd on technology (might have the order wrong there).

Biggest problem he has is consistency. Somedays he posts 250km, some hits 500! It makes it hard to keep track of what he is doing, where he has ridden and the km covered. Combined with his difficulties in technology, it will be difficult to prove his record attempt.

I have had dealings with Miles .. both in Melbourne .. and recently. His grasp of technology is ZERO .. as a simple silly example .. I bought him some kit in Uk that he wanted .. and sent it to him in OZ. But despite providing IBAN and BIC numbers he will not reimburse me thru the banking system .. and refuses to do so thru Paypal .. as he claims that he does not want to be bombarded with ads.

trying to get this modest reimbursement dragged on for about 2 months with a raft of e-mail exchanges .. but in the end I had to give up .. he just would not use any logical way to reimburse me.

not sure about skint .. will not use IBAN/BIC as does not understand that these are needed for an international bank transfer ... keeps insisting that i give him sort code and account number .. and no matter how much i explain .. that this would work internally in OZ .. but not for an international payment and anyway the IBAN/BIC has my UK sort code and account number buried in them .. he still will not pay. In the end I got so exasperated I just told him to S*D OFF